thank you for succinctly explaining the evolutionary pressure that created the mindset of FLORIDA MAN

Isn’t it fascinating how many humans would play a video of burning wood on their TV during winter as a way to feel cosy. It might be evolutionary, perhaps, but a large part of human culture is about enjoying the act of burning wood.

The analogy that immediately comes to mind - what this approach might look like in an actual educational institution - is schools that teach creationism "alongside" evolutionary science. Which feels very telling.

this is why we get people asking things like "what's the evolutionary purpose of this feature" there isn't one. there is no purpose for anything in your body or any other creature's body. the only reason we are how we are is because our ancestors' bodies made them less likely to be killed by nature

Let's blame the High Evolutionary

a man in a purple suit is pointing up with his finger

ALT: a man in a purple suit is pointing up with his finger

We also evolved in such a way that constant panic and dread is unstainable from a mental health perspective. We push things to the back of our brain bc we literally have to. It's hardwired into us. It takes effort and above average awareness in order to overcome all that evolutionary programming.

I love this and it kinda makes me wish the later seasons had worked out better. There was an evolutionary elegance to Robert Patrick now following her around and saying, “Scully, that’s crazy...!"

Joseph Henrich's THE SECRET OF OUR SUCCESS argues (persuasively to my mind) that one of the evolutionary adaptations that most contributes to human success—a thing we're *much* better at than other species—is that we're *really* good at copying behaviors that work, even when we don't know how

BDbretdevereaux.bsky.socialOct 9, 2024 2:57am

One of the responses this thread (on the Bad Place) got, a few times, ran roughly "if magic is common, magicians become engineers" or variations of that theme - the assumption that magic would be rapidly systematized by fictional pre-modern societies. And I don't think this is right. 1/

From an evolutionary perspective, given the tremendous number of sperm cells males produce for a single ejaculation, in ration to the number of eggs females release during estrus, it's pretty clear that monogamy wasn't in the plan. Culturally, however, there are serious advantages to it for ♀ & 🧑‍🧒‍🧒.

Chavez is not math rock, I'd hesitate to call them noise rock, they are simply a Rock band, the next evolutionary step in the genre